Market Midday: Techs take breather

Techs were sluggish at midday Tuesday following Monday's big gains. The Nasdaq retreated 11.92 to 2618.36 and the Dow Jones industrial average fell 66.17 to 10,749.81.

Inter@ctive Week's @Net Index was flat at 310.

Among stocks in the news today, S3 Inc. (Nasdaq: SIII) fell 3/16 to 9 1/4 after announcing Tuesday it would acquire Diamond Multimedia Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: DIMD), which was fell 13/16 to 4 7/8.

Salon (Nasdaq: SALN) had yet to trade in its market debut. Shares priced at $10.50.

Qwest Communications International (Nasdaq: QWST) was up 5/16 to 36 15/16 as the company continued to pursue US West and Frontier.

Wild card Corel Corp. (Nasdaq: CORL), was down 1/8 to 3 13/16 after it reported Monday second quarter earnings double what analysts expected.

Micron Electronics (Nasdaq: MUEI) jumped 7/16 to 11 1/8, or 4 percent, after topping Wall Street estimates. Other PC issues were mixed. Dell Computer Corp. (Nasdaq: DELL) dropped 3/16 to 38 2/4. Gateway Inc. (NYSE: GTW) fell 1/4 to 65 3/16. and IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM) fell 3/8 to 124 3/8. Apple Computer Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) was steady at 46 1/2, and Compaq Computer Corp. (NYSE: CPQ) rose 3/4 to 22 7/8.

Among leading Net issues, Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO) fell 1 5/8 to 157 1/4 while Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) gained 1 3/16 to 124 11/16. America Online Inc. (NYSE: AOL) dropped 5/8 to 114 3/4 and CMGI Inc. (Nasdaq: CMGI) lost 2 3/4 to 100 1/4. Other Net notables included: Lycos Inc. (Nasdaq: LCOS), down 1 3/8 to 95 1/4; Infoseek Corp. (Nasdaq: SEEK), down 1 1/8 to 48; At Home (Nasdaq: ATHM), was up 15/16 to 58 13/16; and Mindspring (Nasdaq: MSPG), up 3 13/16 to 73 3/4.

Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) fell 1 7/16 to 87 1/2 and Intel Corp. (Nasdaq: INTC) dropped 1 3/16 to 55 5/8 while Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD) was flat at 19 3/16.

Lucent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: LU) dropped 1 1/16 to 64 5/16 and Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO) was even at 61 9/16. 3Com Corp.(Nasdaq: COMS) which will report earnings after the bell was up 3/8 to 31 5/16. Verity Inc.(Nasdaq: VRTY), also scheduled to report profits, was down 7/8 to 46 7/8.

Oracle Corp. (Nasdaq: ORCL) was steady at 34 1/8, AT&T Corp. (NYSE: T) down 1/8 to 56 3/8 and Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW) dipped1 5/8 to 66 15/16.